It's bad enough that Pat McAfee is so omnipresent and obnoxious, but does he also have to be so thin-skinned?
ESPN's prize hog used Monday's episode of his daily talk show to complain about what a bad experience he had at the University of Utah when he was there for College GameDay this past weekend. More specifically, McAfee was aggravated because the school had posted a video (now deleted) in which a couple of students were prompted to do an impression of him. "He's gonna say a corny line," said one student who was predicting McAfee's GameDay pick. "He's gonna be like, 'Houston, we got a problem. Gimme the Utah Utes.'" For the record, McAfee picked the visiting Cougars in Saturday's game, but Utah won, 21-13.
Another student mocked McAfee for his well-worn bit of taking off his shirt on set. "Bro, Pat, we love you, bro, but keep the shirt on. No one's trying to see that. We don't care. These are college kids, bro. Keep your shirt on, homie." I have to admit: These youthful Utes had him dead to rights.
Maybe the accuracy was why it stuck in McAfee's craw. In a split-screen view featuring a new A.J. Hawk animation—"standing mode" was included in the latest patch—the former punter spent a few minutes dwelling on how some college kids gently roasting him was comparable to when Charlie Kirk was fatally shot at Utah Valley University last year. No, really.
A transcript of the relevant part:
You know why I didn't like it, mostly? Right before I go out there, I see the University of Utah's Instagram page, OK? The university's—this is our—they put out a video: "Could you do an impression of Pat McAfee?" And one kid goes, "Ah, he's corny." Another kid calls me "creepy." If these kids would've done this on their own blogs, all good. I mean, everybody's taking shots at me anyways for everything, I get it. If the two ladies that were hosting that put that out on their own blog, I'd be OK with that. The university puts that out, as I'm about to go out and do an informercial for the place? And then I'm walking in front of thousands of these people—this is how the university feels about it? It's an uncomfortable feeling—I'm getting a lot of shrapnel from a lot of places. The university is putting this out? That is something I just had never experienced in my entire life, so it kinda set me off a little bit, made me feel a little bit weird.
And then I thought to myself: Has anything really scary happened at a college gathering in the state of Utah recently? Do we think we should be amplifying reasons for why people hate my guts, as a university? I don't know. So it was a lot of mixed feelings for me going out there. And then obviously, the kicker goes "Only $1 million?" It's like, all right, I hate this place. They got a good football team, though. But I've never been more uncomfortable, honestly, in my life, walking in front of a group of people after watching their university put out a post basically dogging me just moments before. I saw a lot of people say, "They didn't even say anything that bad." It's the university putting that out. It's not, like, a blog. It's the actual place that we're at. So I'll hopefully never go to that place. I think I have COVID or something whenever GameDay goes back, if I'm still a part of GameDay.
[...]
The New York Times, do what you gotta do, I guess. All the sports media tabloids people, they quote me out of context, they build a narrative about me. But you got people that really hate my guts out there. Like, really hate my guts. And I understand it, I guess. This is just a part of what life is, especially 'cause I have a lot of things that are very hatable about me. I can certainly understand that. But the university gaslighting some of it, right before I go out there to talk about your school, especially with what happened 40 miles south in Salt Lake City a little over a year ago? I did not enjoy that. I was very, very uncomfortable.
"The kicker" is a reference to a kicking contest held during GameDay, where a student selected via raffle tries to make a field goal and win money. The participating Utah student was referencing the fact that the week before, a student from rival BYU got to kick for $3 million, because Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith and his business partner added to the pot. If you watch the video, it was clearly intended as a joke—you know, the kind of thing Pat McAfee tries to do in between apologies for the lines that don't land.
The Instagram video clearly affected McAfee's commentary on the set, too. At the start of GameDay, he made sure to mention the Instagram post where some student made fun of him for always taking off his shirt, before he—surprise—took off his shirt for the crowd. "New York Times already saying it: This asshole is shirtless at 9:02 a.m. Eastern," he yelled afterward.
Of course, this asshole was also placated. "The safety and security of our on-air team, crew and fans is paramount at College GameDay," ESPN said in a pathetic statement, via The Athletic. "We are committed to ensuring a safe environment, and given the very real threats that members of our team face, we take issues involving their safety seriously. We support Pat and recognize the very real and valid concerns he has around safety and security."
McAfee even elicited an apology from the school. "Our goal during the visit was to create lighthearted engagement regarding Pat being back on campus, but we missed the mark," the university said in a statement. "University officials have reached out to Pat to express appreciation and regret. We sincerely apologize for creating any perception that Pat was unsafe or unwelcome on our campus. Nothing could be further from the truth."
The guy who once aired out a random college student over a fake rumor is now concerned about safety. Nobody needs to apologize for making fun of the guy whose job is doing a Frank the Tank impression to entertain people born in 2007. Your target audience is telling you that the shtick's getting old, Pat. At this point, you're Bert Kreischer with more CTE. But I also see a silver lining to this saga: Although his terrible music might suggest otherwise, McAfee clearly cares what people think of him. Maybe if other parts of the country tell him he's a one-note hack, he'll eventually go away.
